Going… Going… GONE!

Our Vintage Cigar Auction was held at Boisdale Canary Wharf on Monday evening. Not only was it a huge success with almost 96% of the Lots entered being sold but it was also a great herf for all of the attendees.

Almost 80 people attended the event and there were 100’s of absentee bidders from all over the globe.

The results were posted live on my last blog and updated with after auction sales on the auction website.

Highest priced Lot was the Partagas 160^th anniversary humidor – Highly desirable now and fabulous smokes but there was something for every price range and many bidders left the room very happy indeed.

I’m often asked ‘Who are the bidders?’ smoker or collectors? ‘ I think the most accurate answer is both. Although many are a combination of smoker and collector.

I am amazed at the amount of interest in Cohiba limited editions which seem to continue to climb in value with every auction. Pre Embargo Havanas are also definitely on the up. Davidoff and Dunhill ever popular and more than steady in value.

Hunters and Frankau kindly supplied us with Rafael Gonzales Perlas, Romeo Petit Churchill and Montecristo Edmundo to smoke before and after the auction, Balvenie did two fabulous whisky tastings with their Caribbean Cask and 17 year old, Boisdale supplied fabulous canapés and as did White House of Hendon. My thanks to all of our sponsors for their generous support.

Fair to say a great evening was had by all. Looking forward to our Winter Auction and accepting entries from now. Bear in mind our Auctions are a very small part of our year round vintage Havana cigar sales and we are happy to value/buy/sell for and on behalf of clients every day of the year.

Thursday was cigar and whisky tasting night at Robert Graham Ltd – Cambridge, another fabulous and packed event with over 30 attendees sampling some fabulous cigars introduced by the equally fabulous and very knowledgeable (As well as entertaining) George Sosa of Alec Bradley Cigars. The cigars we sampled were :

Alec Bradley Black Market Robusto
Tempus Terra Novo Robusto Natural
Tempus Terra Novo Robusto Maduro

The Tempus was an exclusive opportunity to smoke a cigar that has not been released to the UK market yet – They will arrive in Sept/Early Oct. Someone wanted to buy a box on the night!

The ‘take home’ cigar at the end of the night was the Prensado Robusto (Churchill was No. 1 rated cigar of 2011)

The whiskies sampled were Robert Graham Ltd independent award winning bottlings:

Cearban
Clynelish 1995
Hoebeg

We had an eclectic mix of chaps from the UK, US and even Australia and all enjoyed a great evening.

If you haven’t tried Alec Bradley cigars yet, you really should do, they are very rich, full flavoured and smooth. Well-crafted with very attractive wrappers and excellent presentation.

My thanks to the Robert Graham Team for putting together such a splendid evening, George Sosa for coming over to our little Island and Scott from Tor for providing the great cigars.

View all the pictures from this event at the end of this post.

We are already planning our next Cambridge tasting event which will be in conjunction with our friends at Hunters & Frankau and will feature some of the finest Havana cigars. Email and join our events mailing list [email protected]

Next week I’m looking forward to a long overdue visit to our Norfolk offices where I understand we are setting up a website to sell empty cigar boxes! (I probably smoked all of the cigars already!) My sales team tell me that we sell so many boxes that are made into guitars and handbags as well as restaurants that use them to serve the bill in, they are quite stunned! So we have a huge collection (Around 10,000 boxes!) from long gone brands (All shapes and sizes) that we will have the first empty box website in the world (Allegedly!) too funny.

OK well that’s the end of a very looooong week for me so I’m off home to kick back for the weekend, armed with a bottle of Ailein Mor and a box of Cohiba Behike 56 (Smoking quite beautifully at this time)

Have a great weekend

Peaceful puffing

Mitchell

Cigar Auction Results Live!

This blog comes to you live from our cigar auction at Boisdale Canary Wharf.

All results are subject to final verification on our Auction website http://www.cigarauctions.co.uk/ on Tuesday (changes only due to typing errors!)

Best of luck to all of our bidders and our sellers

Mitchell

View the pictures from the auction below.

1 – £820	2 – £2000	3 – £2000	4 – £1900	5 – £200
6 – £400	7 – £910	8 – £1500	9 – £1180	10 – £1500
11 – £1500	12 – £150	13 – £290	14 – £360	15 – £460
16 – £280	17 – £140	18 – £1120	19 – Pass	20 – £1000
21 – £450	22 – £450	23 – £200	24 – £200	25 – £380
26 – £380	27 – £360	28 – £380	29 – £380	30 – £720
31 – £250	32 – £600	33 – £180	34 – £480	35 – £180
36 – £70	37 – £350	38 – £320	39 – £2000	40 – £140
41 – £170	42 – £360	43 – £70	44 – £70	45 – £90
46 – £60	47 – Pass	48 – £320	49 – £200	50 – £500
51 – £300	52 – £240	53 – £300	54 – £150	55 – £50
56 – £110	57 – £200	58 – £520	59 – £620	60 – £720
61 – £920	62 – £420	63 – £420	64 – £420	65 – £380
66 – £650	67 – £160	68 – £350	69 – £450	70 – £450
71 – £520	72 – £620	73 – £110	74 – £600	75 – £320
76 – £260	77 – £290	78 – £110	79 – £340	80 – £420
81 – £170	82 – £280	83 – £360	84 – £420	85 – £410
86 – £200	87 – £100	88 – £520	89 – £240	90 – £160
91 – £980	92 – £320	93 – £140	94 – £1420	95 – £410
96 – £220	97 – £120	98 – £190	99 – £190	100 – £420
101 – £620	102 – £420	103 – £250	104 – £280	105 – £380
106 – £200	107 – £680	108 – £780	109 – £160	110 – Pass
111 – Pass	112 – £320	113 – £300	114 – £380	115 – £400
116 – £250	117 – £480	118 – £720	119 – £700	120 – £680
121 – £320	122 – £380	123 – £450	124 – £400	125 – £220
126 – £220	127 – £180	128 – £180	129 – £480	130 – £480
131 – £520	132 – £200	133 – £400	134 – £280	135 -pass
136 – £850	137 – £300	138 – £420	139 – £400	140 – £160
141 – £180	142 – Pass	143 – £360	144 – £220	145 – £250
146 – £600	147 – £620	148 – £420	149 – £580	150 – £40
151 – £150	152 – £420	153 – £200	154 – £380	155 – £350
156 – £200	157 – Pass	158 – £200	159 – Pass	160 – £90
161 – £220	162 – £480	163 – £1350	164 – £450	165 – £1520
166 – £1700	167 – £1380	168 – £1750	169 – £1720	170 – £1720
171 – £1780	172 – £1720	173 – £1180	174 – £650	175 – £630
176 – £620	177 – £620	178 – £500	179 – £520	180- 760
181 – £2820	182 – £2950	183 – £1750	184 – £1650	185 – £1650
186 – £450	187 – £820	188 – £780	189 – £780	190 – £680
191 – £200	192 – £250	193 – £170	194 – £100	195 – £110
196 – £700	197 – £600	198 – £600	199 – £620	200 – £600
201- 650	202 – £620	203 – £620	204 – £620	205 – £620
206 – £520	207 – £1450	208 – £900	209 – £420	210 – £480
211 – £820	212 – £800	213 – £780	214 – £480	215 – £480
216 – £480	217 – £400	218 – £100	219 – Pass	220 – £1220
221 – £1220	222 – £2600	223 – £340	224 – £2300	225 – Pass
226 – Pass	227 – £1800	228 – £2200	229 – Pass	230 – £300
231 – £250	232 – £780	233 – Pass	234 – £480	235 – Pass
236 – Pass	237 – Pass	238 – £1200	239 – £1220	240 – £7000
241 – £4900	242 – £120	243 – £1600	244 – Pass	245 – Pass
246 – £820	247 – £1350	248 – £1200	249 – £780	250 – £1450
251 – £1380	252 – £1300	253 – £1000	254 – £250	255 – £880
256 – £1650	257 – £2700	258 – £820	259 – £680	260 – £1050
261 – £1320	262 – £2600	263 – £2200	264 – £520	265 – £550
266 – £450	267 – £420	268 – £820	269 – £820	270 – £1450
271 – £720	272 – £1020	273 – £320	274 – £350	275 – £450
276 – £1100	277 – £360	278 – £3600	279 – £550	280 – Pass
281 – £520	282 – £4600	283 – £3600	284 – £3000	285 – £4800
286 – £1520	287 – £720	288 – £2700	289 – £10500	290 – £1700
291 – £320	292 – £550	293 – Pass	294 – £1220	295 – £800
296 – Pass	297 – £380	298 – £1600	299 – £1700	300 – £40
301 – £40	302 – £100	303 – £160	304 – £320	305 – £250
306 – Pass	307 – £150	308 – £650	309 – £410	310 – £1300
311 – £350	312 – £120	313 – £600	314 – £220	315 – £280
316 – £250	317 – £60	318 – £3250	319 – Pass	320 – Pass
321 – £420	322 – Pass	323 – £600	324 – £570	325 – £260
326 – £1200	327 – Pass	328 – £820	329 – £250	330 – £480
331 – £300	332 – £550	333 – £550	334 – £550	335 – £1050
336 – £1050	337 – £780	338 – £750	339 – £1000	340 – £600
341 – £580	342 – £1250	343 – £2400	344 – £2500	345 – £1600
346 – £600	347 – Pass

Going …going…..

It’s been a week of trains, planes and automobiles for me (remember the Steve Martin film “Planes, Trains and Automobiles?!”) as I visited all 10 of our retail shops around the UK and Hamburg.

Starting on Monday at our fabulous La Casa del Habano in very sunny Hamburg, where my partner Christoph and I herfed our way through an extraordinary quantity of H. Upmann Royal Robustos which paired up nicely with Cuban Legendario Rum from Cuba. We managed to get through all of our work rather rapidly and most of the afternoon was spent chilling in the cigar lounge which was packed full as usual with regular clients of LCDH.

Tuesday was an early start flying on Squeezy Jet up to Robert Graham Ltd in Glasgow. Chatting with my colleague Linda, I lit up a cigar outside the shop of course (no exemption in Scotland sadly) and completely coincidentally the fire alarm for the whole block went off! Hundreds of people left the buildings and headed to the street and within a minute I could see two fire engines coming down the road!!! so, we decided to scarper off to our new shop on West George street and see how the builders are getting on.

Well, all I can say is “WOW”! The new Robert Graham shop is going to be amazing – It’s beautiful and it’s HUGE. The walk in humidor will be quite breath-taking and have the most comprehensive range of premium cigars in the UK as well as private client lockers. The shop will also have a massive range of smokers accessories, pipe tobaccos, premium Whisky and Wine and a comfortable Whisky tasting lounge. If all goes to plan we will be relocating from West Nile street by the end of June….and holding some great opening evenings too.

After Glasgow, I headed over to Edinburgh where we have two fabulous shops. One in Rose street and the other on Canongate. I love checking round the cigar shops as I always find cigars in the walk in humidors that I thought were sold out ages ago. In Edinburgh, I spotted plenty of UK regional editions like Por Larranaga Regalias de Londres, Flor de Cano short Robusto, La Gloria Cubana Gloriosos etc…the joys of being a cigar merchant!

My partner Ron and I had a sampling session in the tasting lounge at Canongate with some clients of Robert Graham- Cambridge who were visiting Scotland! I think the consensus was that our Ailein Mor was simply outstanding as well as great value for money.

After catching up at Robert Graham – West Hampstead and Alfie Turmeaus cigar shop in Mayfair on Wednesday, I jumped on the Virgin train to Liverpool at stupid o’clock on Thursday morning to check out our two Liverpool Turmeaus shops. I had a Siglo VI on arrival in the store and followed it with a 2008 Cohiba Robusto before heading off to Turmeaus in Chester where I herfed through a Punch Serie D’Oro no.1 and a dram of Robert Graham’s Islay malt ‘ The Hoebeg’…yup…Chester Turmeaus is now licenced and sells Robert Graham’s award winning range of Single Malt Whisky. And of course it’s legal to sample cigars in store.

Back to the office Thursday evening till midnight to catch up with all the auction action for this Monday! The event, as expected is sold out (almost 100 people attending the evening!) and I’m looking forward to a great evening, Balvenie Whisky tasting and 3 great English Market Selection Havana cigars – thanks to Hunters and Frankau and Canapés from fabulous cigars friendly Boisdale.

Preliminary ( i.e. subject to final checking) bidding results will be published on my blog as the auction happens on Monday and confirmed on the auction website on Tuesday.

Next week I’ll be at Robert Graham – Cambridge on Thursday evening for another in our series of Whisky and Cigar Tastings. Fairly sure this event with Alec Bradley cigars and Dancing Stag Single Malt is another sold out event but if you hurry, we may be able to squeeze you in.

Weathers forecast to be good this weekend so I’ll be kicking back in the garden which will make a nice change! Let’s hope we have a few more weeks of cigar smoking Summer weather to enjoy. 🙂

Have a smokey weekend

Peaceful puffing

Mitchell

Whisky & Cigar Heaven!

Had one helluva herf at Robert Graham – Cambridge last Thursday evening. We had a HUGE crowd of cigars and whisky aficionado’s, in fact I have never seen the lounge so full!!

Almost 40 friends joined us for a very, very smoky evening of drinks, smokes and canapés.

Our Davidoff representative Andrew gave a short talk about the two excellent cigars that we enjoyed, the Davidoff Entreacto and Puro D’oro Deliciosos cigars and we enjoyed a DVD of Henki Kelner from Davidoff in the Dominican Republic explaining the long and hard years that it took to develop the fantastic Puro D’Oro. I remember meeting Henki in the DR 9 years ago on a Davidoff trip and learned a great deal from him.

We matched up the Entreacto with our exclusive Robert Graham Dancing Stag Benrinnes 23 year old and the full bodied Puro D’Oro with our exclusive Robert Graham Dancing Stag ( and rather peaty/smoky) Bowmore 22 year old which made an excellent match. Our new Team member Julian introduced the two Robert Graham single malts to the crowd – welcome to the team Julian 🙂

Davidoff cigars are available online at C.Gars Ltd and Robert Graham Ltd as well as a limited range in all of our retail cigar shops across the country. We expect to expand the range substantially in store over the coming months. The quality of Davidoff cigars is impeccable, it’s a large range with something sure to please every smoker.

Thanks to Andrew and to Davidoff for all their help in organizing a fabulous evening.

Our next tasting is selling out fast and scheduled for the 13th June, again at our Cambridge store. Our guest of honour is George Sosa from Alec Bradley cigars and we will be featuring 2 fabulous premium handmade cigars:

– Alec Bradley Black Market Robusto
– Alec Bradley Prensado Robusto

And… Additional SURPRISE CIGARS to sample that are not yet on the market!

As usual we will be matching up the cigars with some exclusive Dancing Stag single malt whisky from our steadily growing award winning range.

Cigars, whisky and canapés and no doubt another evening to remember. If all goes to plan I’ll be there too and look forward to seeing our regulars and some new faces too. Book soonest to avoid disappointment.

I can’t believe we have already been at our Cambridge location for almost 6 months, the store has a fabulous range of premium cigars in two walk in humidors and a select range of single malts including our full range of Independent bottled Robert Graham whisky. Kick back in the tasting lounge with complimentary drinks and some chillin’ jazz music… We made it as comfortable as possible for our clients.

Auction time is upon us – June 10^th at the fabulous Boisdale Canary Wharf.
Full details on the auction website.

Almost 350 Lots of Vintage, aged, rare, mature, Davidoff, Dunhill, Limited edition and pre-embargo cigars will be sold and no doubt some bargains will be scored !

Join us for the whisky and cigars tastings before and after the auction and join in the auction action too 🙂

Custom Blend Fresh Robusto Cigars Mas Fuerte We were hoping to have a Cuban cigar roller at the event but regrettably her dates clashed with another event. We do have some of her fabulous custom blends (Mas Fuerte) available for anyone that would like to try a freshly rolled Havana

For our clients in Glasgow who frequent our charming little shop on West Nile street managed by the lovely Linda, the sad news is that we will be closing down in the next month or so… BUT!… We have listened to your comments and wishes for a larger cigar and whisky shop and Ron and I are very proud to announce that as soon as we close West Nile street we will be opening what we believe will be the biggest and best cigar store in the UK, very close to our West Nile street location 🙂 The deal is signed and the shop fitters are already working. We will have a huge range of whisky and cigars (As well as pipe tobaccos, wine. Champagne and delicious chocolate) over two floors of pure decadence! More details to follow.

I spent the weekend in Biarritz, I’d like to say it was sunny Biarritz but I think the weather was about the same as London. Surprised to say that I couldn’t find a single cigar shop! Not a problem as I had my baggie of smokes with me (UK regional Ramon Petit Belicosos and Punch Serie D’Oro no.1) which kept me well satisfied.

I can honestly say though, that I can’t remember any other location where I have seen so many cigar or cigarette smokers. The same stupid smoking ban exists in France as in the UK but clearly it does not deter. When the weather was reasonable, loads of people were smoking outside of just about every bar and restaurant that I saw. I even saw one bar that looked like it was ‘inside/out’ so there was no one inside and everyone was drinking and smoking outside!

The smoking ban is so funny, it has simply forced everyone to seek out places where they can smoke sort of outdoors or semi outdoors (Covered areas) it really is quite ludicrous.

That’s about all the news for this week, I’m off to Boisdale Canary Wharf for dinner this evening… And a few smokes. Bravo Boisdale – fabulous cigar friendly restaurants.

Peaceful puffing

Mitchell

Peru report – Inka Secret Blend!

I created the cigar brand Inka Secret Blend last November to fill a gap in our UK range of cigars. I wanted them to appeal across the spectrum of our cigar smoking clients and not clash with existing ranges of excellent New World cigars. New World cigars are gaining in popularity all the time as the cigar smoker market expands and new smokers are willing to try new brands from new regions.

Secret Blend are different as they are a Puros made in Peru i.e. filler, binder and wrapper – 100% all from Peru. I played around with the blend for many months till I was happy with a range of sizes in natural and maduro wrappers that would deliver a sweet and spicy full flavour but medium strength cigar. My aim was to have a blend that would not display any bitterness or aggression and the blend integrity from one box to the next had to be consistent. Construction and draw was of paramount importance to me as well of course but knowing that every cigar is draw tested made me very confident.

We managed to achieve what we set out to do and released the Inka – Secret Blend range to our clients as soon as we had successfully registered the trade mark. To say that we were happy with the initial sell out is an understatement but after all we do have a huge database of clients stretching back to the mid 1990’s and many of our clients will try anything we recommend. The acid test was our clients reactions and whether they would reorder. We were not disappointed! Repeat orders and regular orders rolled in at an alarming rate and we have been struggling to import Inka – Secret Blend fast enough to keep up with the demand. In fact it’s fast becoming our best selling non-Cuban cigar.

I kept the packaging simple to keep the prices down on the range but don’t think this isn’t a premium cigar because it most certainly is. The Rojo (Red band) range are 100% handmade long filler and the Azul (Blue band) range are handmade medium filler.

The test market was the UK as we are of course the largest specialist cigar merchant in the UK with many cigar stores and a huge mail order and internet business but our plans are to further develop the brand Internationally. With that in mind I decided that it was high time that I headed over to Peru to check out the Tabacalera del Oriente tobacco fields and cigar factory thoroughly and that’s what I did last week!

My Partner Ron Morrison from Robert Graham Ltd who is developing the branding Internationally met up with me in his beautiful Florida home – A perfect way to spend the first nights herfing, overlooking the beach. We smoked Inka Bombaso cigars accompanied by our award winning Highland malt whisky, Ailein Mor until… Very late 🙂

The next day we headed from Miami to Lima and spent a day touring round the Inka pyramid archaeological sites which was very interesting. Lunch smokes and drinks at a delightful restaurant overlooking the water. El Salto del Fraile is highly recommended (And cigar friendly!) and afternoon drinks at the Gran Hotel Bolivar in Plaza San Martin.

We then took the flight over to Tarapoto which is where our partner Gennaro Lettieri of Tabacalera del Oriente collected us from the airport with a big baggie of new sizes of Secret Blend for us to try. After a long evening sampling session we agreed that the blend on the new sizes was better than ever.

The two seeds (Some call them the Mother and father) of Nicotiana species originally came from the Peruvian and Bolivian Andes and thereafter were, I understand grown in other regions.

The next few days were spent in the fields and the factory where we observed and learnt about every step in the production process from seed to cigar. The operation was impressively HUGE to say the least, I was amazed at the many hectares of tobacco plants growing as well as the amount of prime Peruvian tobacco being aged and matured to perfection. I was also impressed that Gennaro had already rolled enough Secret Blend cigars to speed up our imports and avoid us running out of stock as has happened all too frequently due to the popularity of the brand.

We have now developed 3 additional sizes of Secret Blend for the UK and they will be rolling out in the next 2 months if all goes to plan. The packaging is a step up but the prices will be keener than ever as we are purchasing such huge volume now. To say this is an exciting project is an understatement.

We will also be launching a range of Secret Blend Internationally with a different set of vitolas as well as super premium packaging, all at a value for money prices. More details to follow.

Many people have asked me what can you compare these cigars with – Cubans, Dominicans? Hondurans? Nicaraguans? The answer is that I can’t compare them. The reason is that the other regions mentioned all make superb cigars and our Peruvian Puros are quite simply different. They may not suit all, but they will suit most cigar smokers, novice and experienced alike.

The people we met in Lima and Tarapoto were super friendly and Tarapoto is a great city. The fauna and flora are breath-taking.

My thanks to Gennaro and his team for giving us such a warm welcome. We are looking forward to our next visit later this year.

Back to Miami to relax for a day before flying home and I enjoyed herfing at Deco Drive cigars on Lincoln. South Beach is buzzier than ever and I love Deco Drive cigars – Always great service.

Back to London and back in the thick of the action! the June 10th cigar auction Lots are now live and bids are already rolling in. It’s a huge 340 + Lot auction and our events are always great fun.

Auction catalogue is on this link, Bids can of course be placed online or by email always happy to advise regarding any specific Lots and a reminder to be careful to bid on Lots that can be shipped to where you are located (See notes on each Lot)

You can also join us and bid at the auction at Boisdale as well enjoy a whisky and cigar tasting.

Next week we have a Cuban cigar roller at our offices rolling ‘ freshies!’ Juramys Valdés Alguezabal began her career at the Romeo y Julieta factory in Havana and quickly demonstrated the skill and understanding required to achieve the highest ranking within the categories defined by the Cuban Cigar industry before transferring across to the Partagás factory where she has been for the last 9 years. We are looking forward to welcoming her.

May 23^rd cigar and whisky tasting at Cambridge Robert Graham is now fully booked but we still have a few places available at the June 13^th tasting event and I look forward to seeing friends for an evening of fine single malt and cigars at both.

That’s all the news for now,

Peaceful puffing,

Mitchell